Transforming Nursing Education with Technology

Jerelyn Resnick - UW Bothell, Nursing Program

I am exploring best practices and challenges of adapting learning technologies to the needs of our BSN completion students, a population that is place-bound, diverse and multi-generational, and which must balance work, family, community and school responsibilities with our region’s worsening traffic. Taking advantage of the expanded learning experiences offered by new media such as discussion boards, virtual classrooms, webcams, chat rooms, blogs, wikis, podcasts and video- and audio-streaming allows students and teachers to create and critique knowledge and to apply theory to real-world problems in ways traditionally-taught courses cannot. In addition, I am exploring how these technologies can support the interactive and dynamic flow of discovery, critique, contribution and growth. Currently, I have far more questions than answers, some of which revolve around what the technologies can offer, and some which center on how technologies can transform pedagogies. Additional critical aspects of this exploration, while not SOTL questions in themselves, are the issues of faculty buy-in, student adoption of new ways of learning, and availability of technical support for students taking our courses on-site and online.

This poster presents highlights of what I’m learning about using these technologies in hybrid courses. Formative evaluation of their integration in these courses was accomplished through observation of student performance on projects and feedback. Summative evaluation occurred through course evaluations and specific technology-related questions. The poster also illustrates how I am transforming a traditionally-constructed adolescent health course into a highly interactive distance-learning course. Taught this fall, it will be the first distance learning course in our program and will be used as a model for the transformation of additional nursing courses to distance learning formats. Formative assessment of the course development includes feedback from technology experts. Implementation assessment strategies will be based on best practices for distance learning courses.